The Vanguard

There's no lack of post-apocalyptic zombie films in the world.  Lately there's been no lack of virus-turns-humans-into-fast-moving-zombie films.

The Vanguard is one of these films, but it's different enough to be interesting. First, there's no attempt to be stylish or cool. Unless you think a guy tooling around the post-apocalyptic woods on his Schwinn in ripped jeans and shades is cool (hint: it isn't).

Max is the only man remaining in the area where the zombie plague broke out. He hunts and fishes and sets snares for rabbits, barely getting by. Sometimes he must fight off zombies or run from them; as he battles them with his handmade spear or his hatchets he laments the loss of his rifle. He hints at having done horrible things to survive this long.

Max begins to notice that the zombies have started evolving; hunting in packs. He begins to study them to find out how to fight and survive around them while he waits for a mysterious person to return to the place where everything went wrong. The hub of civilization where, we learn, the wealthy decided to handle overpopulation by infecting the undesirables with a virus. Obviously nothing went according to plan.

For the first part it's more of a tale of one man surviving alone against the world; later on Max meets some people who think he may be the key to stopping the zombies. As they head towards a resistance camp that may or may not exist, they become hunted by both zombies and corporate soldiers.

If most of this sounds familiar, it is. The Vanguard differentiates itself in a few ways. The movie is more of a character piece than it is a horror/gore film. It's about Max and then it's about Max and the people he teams up with. They all manage to be interesting in different ways, and each of them played a different piece leading up to the apocalypse. For viewers willing to stick with the film, it'll reward you with more than just gore.

That's not to say there's no horror or gore, however.  There are some savage fight scenes complete with spraying blood. Hatchets aren't pleasant weapons, and they aren't the only weapons used here.

The Vanguard has a low budget and I think it could have been a better movie with more funding. I'm impressed with what they managed to accomplished here, though; the cinematagraphy is good, the music is excellent, and the core cast really pull off their parts.

I was very pleasantly surprised by this film. Recommended to post-apocalypse zombie lovers.